Create an "About" tab/page & change the role of the Summary page
The Summary page should really be used for returning users to see snippets of the most important and relevant items they are interested in. A snapshot if you will. For that reason I am proposing a Tab/Page entitled "About".
The "About" tab/page would be used to allow owners to describe their group, its purpose, benefits, offerings, and would hold the information that would be listed in the CollectiveX directory. It would be the only page permitted to be seen by non-members.
It should be the page that a member is sent to if they have never previously viewed the page (no cookie was set for having voewed it), or if the manager clicks a button that forces all members to see the page again (force view that sets cookie once it has been seen). EX: When the information in the "About" page is updated.
The "About" page would contain certain standard fields used for the CollectiveX directory, and other nonstandard information and formatting particular to the purposes of each group.
MORE DETAIL
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SUMMARY PAGE: When my existing members come to the site I want them to see short snippets of what they are looking for: bada bing bada boom. No messing around, no clicking, no scrolling, no selecting etc. It is a homepage of sorts, but very focused on the needs of my constituents. This is where I either have something valuable or new for someone, or they are leaving immediately.
ABOUT PAGE
This is not a place that I want to deliberately send anyone other than new members, unless I have a really good reason to do otherwise such as a change in what the group does/offers/focuses on etc. This is the value prop of the community, the reason for its existence etc., and if an existing member doesn't know why they are participating then that member will not be a strong member and will never be beneficial to either the group or CollectiveX.
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I agree. Right now on some of the groups that I am apart of, I have to scroll down for a while before I can see any of the new members, photos, objectives, ect. When I promote the group, it would be nice to have new members be either taken directly to the About page or have it really noticeable for them to find their way there. That way we don't have to put so much information on the Summary, then have the Links, Headlines, Etc before they get to the interesting part of meeting the other members or seeing their activies along side their photos at the bottom. Besides new members reading about who we are, I really want propsective members to see the other members photos at the bottom and to be intrigued by the activity that is taking place amongst the members in that area.
I also agree that the Summary should be more of a snippet of things to quickly browse through. I like the idea of the Headlines, Links & such, but it takes up way too much room, even if there is nothing listed under them. I know we can't have a million tabs at the top, so perhaps there could be smaller boxes over to the side with all these things? Those who want to read up on what's going on or want to check out links, shouldn't have a problem not having all that front and center.
I tried developing my summary page further to give directions for existing members and potential members. You can have a look at "http://phf.collectivex.com/main/summary":http://phf.collectivex.com/main/summary. The downside of this was the work required to write the HTML.
I agree an about page is a good idea and something I would definitely use if it were available.